Facebook’s Forthcoming Music Dashboard

With all the major developments regarding tech companies and music in the past few months -- Amazon, Google, and Apple all announced cloud services -- it only makes sense that any news involving Facebook's vision for the future of music was just around the corner. Rumors of such a vision began leaking through the press yesterday, the components of which could be game changing. From uniting the various standalone streaming platforms to creating a social e-commerce platform that would allow Facebook users to purchase media using credits, it appears as though Facebook's music dashboard is poised to impress. But these are just rumors. It is speculated that more details will be made public at the company's f8 developer conference in August. Take a look at the Inside Facebook article below to see some of the streaming companies Facebook is potentially partnering with for this endeavor, and let us know if you think this will be good or bad for artists in the comments!

Credit: Josh Constine

Facebook is preparing partnerships with several online music services including Spotify that will be hosted in a music dashboard, GigaOm reports. Users will be able to stream music, see what their friends are listening to, and share their own favorites — a realization of a long-time dream within the company to make music a core part of the site. Beyond simply being a valuable way to find new music, the feature has the more practical benefit if increasing engagement, driving users to other parts of the site, and in doing so eventually producing ad revenue. For those in the online music industry, the big potential is in allowing users to buy songs or streaming subscriptions more easily than they have been before, with Facebook Credits

The Facebook Music Landscape

Music is a fundamental driver of sharing, and users are interested in learning about music and discussing it with their Facebook friends. 46 of the top 100 most popular Facebook Pages are music-related, as we covered recently. Music streaming Page tab app developer RootMusic this last week eclipsed Electronic Arts to control the second largest number of monthly active users behind Zynga. Meanwhile, developers are experimenting with Facebook Credits as a digital content payment method. Warner Bros began renting films, and several bands are offering access to pay-per-view concert streaming video in exchange for Facebook’s virtual currency. Facebook is currently hiring a desktop software team, which might be building music scrobbling apps that relay a user’s listening habits.